Original Goshen Pioneer Cemetery

The Original Goshen Pioneer Cemetery preserves a physical connection to the unsettled first decades of pioneer life in Goshen Valley. Unlike communities that developed around a single townsite, early Goshen moved several times as settlers struggled to find a location with dependable water, fertile soil, good drainage, and protection from the elements. The earliest Latter-day Saint pioneers in the valley established themselves in small settlements that became known by names including the Fort, the Bend, and Sandtown. Each location reflected an attempt to adapt to the difficult environment. The Fort provided the security of a concentrated settlement during a period when Utah communities were concerned about conflict with Native peoples. Once settlers felt less need to remain within a fortified community, some began spreading onto better agricultural land. In 1858, settlers moved up the creek to an area where the channel made a pronounced bend. Appropriately, this community became known as the Bend. The land there was productive, but Goshen's settlement pattern remained unsettled. During 1859 and 1860, many families from the old fort moved southwest onto bench land that initially appeared more promising. They soon discovered another problem. Wind repeatedly swept loose sand across the settlement, blowing it into homes, beds, and people's eyes. The place consequently acquired the memorable name Sandtown. Some families remained in the Bend, while others lived in Sandtown and surrounding areas. The result was a scattered pioneer population rather than a single permanent town. A cemetery was established within this early settlement landscape. The earliest death date preserved on the modern cemetery monument is 1858, when Louisa Jane Bigelow died. Over the following two decades, men, women, children, and infants were buried here. Eventually Brigham Young encouraged the scattered settlers to consolidate into the town of Goshen on higher, firmer ground. According to the history preserved by the Daughters of Utah Pioneers, Young also predicted that a highway would eventually pass near the existing cemetery. Settlers were advised to relocate their farms, homes, and cemetery to ground considered more suitable and fertile. Moving a pioneer community could involve physically moving buildings. Many families relocated their cabins rather than abandoning them and constructing entirely new homes. The cemetery presented a much more difficult problem. Families exhumed some of the people buried in the original burial ground and reinterred them in the new Goshen Cemetery south of the newly established town. Unfortunately, no surviving record identifies exactly which bodies were moved. That loss of information is one of the most historically significant aspects of the site. What can be documented is that at least eighteen named men, women, children, and infants remained in the original cemetery. They include Louisa Jane Bigelow, who died in 1858; Diana Dall in 1859; John Shields Gardner in 1862; William Edward Martin and Julia Ann Gardner in 1865; Riley Stewart in 1866; Gertrude Sorensen in 1868; Henry Lyman Cook and Hyrum Cook in 1869; Mary Ann Weech in 1873; Mary Ellen Finch, Soren Christensen Sorenson, and Henry David Dall in 1876; Samuel Weech in 1877; Hyrum Finch in 1879; and Annie Marie Sorensen, Nelce Sorensen, and Soren Sorensen Jr. in 1880. The range of ages represented by these burials—including infants and children—reflects the realities of nineteenth-century settlement, when disease, accidents, childbirth, limited medical care, and other hardships made early death far more common than it is today. After 1880, no additional burials were made in the original cemetery. As Goshen developed around its permanent townsite, the old burial ground became geographically separated from the community it had once served. Yet the people buried there were not forgotten. The Chief Peteetneet Company of the Daughters of Utah Pioneers undertook a project to preserve the cemetery's history and identify the pioneers known to remain there. In 2009, DUP Historical Marker #556 was erected along Highway 6. Rather than placing the monument directly within the burial ground, it was positioned approximately 300 yards south of the cemetery where travelers could encounter the story from the highway. The marker records the names and death years of the eighteen known people who remain buried in the original cemetery and explains why the community and some of its dead were relocated. Today the site offers an unusually tangible reminder that Utah's pioneer towns did not always emerge fully formed in their present locations. Goshen was the product of experimentation, movement, environmental challenges, and difficult decisions about where a community could survive. Even its cemetery moved. But because no record was kept of every person whose remains were transferred, the original burial ground contains an element of uncertainty that can never be completely resolved. The eighteen people whose names are preserved on Marker #556 therefore represent both themselves and an early Goshen community whose complete burial history has been partly lost to time.

Goshen Valley lies in southwestern Utah County, near the southern end of Utah Lake. Latter-day Saint settlement expanded into this part of Utah County during the 1850s as pioneer families searched for agricultural land beyond the communities already developing around Provo, Payson, and other parts of Utah Valley. Goshen's geography offered opportunities but also serious challenges. Creeks provided water, and portions of the valley contained productive soil. Other areas were marshy, saline, sandy, poorly drained, or vulnerable to difficult seasonal conditions. The first settlers therefore moved repeatedly while trying to determine where a permanent agricultural community could succeed. During the 1850s, security was another consideration. The Walker War of 1853–1854 encouraged settlers throughout central Utah to concentrate in forts or compact communities rather than living on isolated farms. Goshen's early Fort belongs to this broader pattern. As the perceived need for defensive concentration diminished, settlers could focus more heavily on agricultural suitability. In 1858, some residents moved to the Bend, where an old creek channel provided better natural drainage and rich farmland. In 1859–1860, many residents of the Fort attempted another settlement on nearby bench land. Persistent wind and drifting sand earned that location the name Sandtown. These repeated relocations demonstrate why Brigham Young's later recommendation to establish a permanent Goshen townsite was significant. The decision was about more than arranging streets. It represented an effort to consolidate a scattered population on land thought better suited for long-term homes and community institutions while leaving some of the most productive lower ground for farming. Cemeteries were essential institutions in pioneer communities, but early burial grounds were often informal compared with modern municipal cemeteries. Graves might be marked with wood, fieldstone, or other materials that deteriorated over time. Written records could be incomplete or disappear entirely. Goshen's decision to move some burials from the old cemetery demonstrates how closely burial practices followed the changing geography of settlement. The newer Goshen Cemetery south of town became the community's permanent burial ground, while the original cemetery ceased receiving burials after 1880. The survival of the old site and the creation of DUP Marker #556 allow both landscapes to be understood together: one represents Goshen's unstable pioneer beginnings, and the other the permanent town that emerged from them.